TRISHITA DAS

★ ★ ★ ★

POETRY

jol-khabar (জলখাবার)

i eat poetry for breakfast
with cherries and green almonds and everything else
that smells like home, feels like the universe
has settled down after a long night, and tastes
cool and sweet. i hold poetry between my fingers
freshly plucked, still hot from the vine, i smell
its newness, the ripe odour of a well-wrought verse,
the sweetness and the promise, before i bite.
it drips over my face, and i want it to condense
into my skin and give me beauty, pour into my limbs
so i have rhythm, sink into my body so i become
an unforgettable image you tell your friends about
tomorrow. i drink it like it’s homemade lemonade,
by the jugful, and come back hungry.
sometimes i store it away as jam, gift it to friends,
or leave it in the corners of my house to rot.
i have enough poetry to share.

market value

when i was born my body was bathed in milk
so that i never forget that i am meant for consumption
by unfamiliar hands and tongues. when the price of onions
began to rise, they began to strip my layers apart instead.
i have learnt to make myself digestible. at my wedding,
i will be swathed in turmeric, kissed by berry stains,
bruised like overripe fruit. i have known as many mouths
as a buffet, greedy fingers picking at my meatiest bits
until i am little more than a carcass, bones stewed over and over
to make diluted soup. they will wrap me up in banana leaves,
steamed and mustard-scented, to sit patiently next to mounds
of the white rice which feeds the poor, and call it auspicious.